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The Presbyterian Women of the Presbyterian Church (USA) participated in a Re-Imagining Conference in Minneapolis, November 4 - 7, 1993. The Conference called for addressing injustices to women world-wide and promoting equal leadership with men throughout all phases of religious experience and expression. It emphasized the fundamental need of Re-Imagining God and Christian theology to get past male-centered language, imagery and authority, and referenced Sophia as the Old Testament personification of wisdom. It was bold and beautiful, and swiftly laid aside by the General Assembly of the PCUSA meeting in June, 1994, saying the Conference "went beyond the boundaries" of Reformed theology. With that judgment, the chances for a new vision for the church were formally laid to rest. Formerly laid to rest. They are presently stirring to life. The Status Quo is crumbling beneath our very feet. We always grow up against our will, or not-- and are now faced with re-imagining God or being forever arrested in our development and never knowing what might have been if we had only been more courageous and imaginative. Re-imagining God is re-imagining the Church is re-imagining the People is re-imagining ourselves, is reinventing ourselves, is making all things new. By "turning the light around." "Turning the light around," is an Old Taoist phrase that became an Old Zen phrase (Zen is what happened when Taoism met Buddhism), that continues to be the crux of the matter in every awakening/re-imagining/reinventing experience. We do not wake up without turning the light around. When we turn the light around, we look within. We examine ourselves. We explore ourselves. We seek ourselves. The Old Taoists/Zenists would ask us, "What is the face that was yours before your parents (or grandparents) were born?" They would be asking, "What is your Original Nature?" It all starts with, and flows from, our aligning ourselves with-- living in accord with-- as servants of-- our Original Nature. Who we were born to be. It is the Story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Which is also the Story of Jesus of Nazareth in the Garden of Gethsemane. It is our story. It is the story of who we are, and who we were born to be, and how do we-- here and now-- at this point in our life-- re-imagine ourselves to be more like we were born to be and less like we have become. By turning the light around. All it takes is, at once, the hardest possible thing, and the simplest imaginable thing. We are never more than one slight perspective shift from the Kingdom of Heaven. The distance of the Hero's Journey (Which is also called "The Spiritual Journey," which is also called "Growing Up") is the distance from the left side of our brain to the right side of our brain. Or, it is the distance from our head to our heart. We don't have to go on some long pilgrimage. We don't have to cross the oceans, or crawl forever on our knees across burning deserts. We only have to change our mind about what's important. (Sin is only being wrong about what is important. Salvation/realization/enlightenment/redemption is being right about what is important. Changing our mind is how we get there-- by re-imagining what is important. By turning the light around.) It is hell. The distance between the Garden of Eden and the Garden of Gethsemane is hell. What would you go to hell for? It is like dying. What would you die for? Would you go to hell before you would dare to re-imagine God? If so, you do not have what it takes to turn the light around. If re-imagining God would be worse for you than going to hell, you do not have what it takes to do the work of re-imagining God-- of re-imagining yourself-- of being different than you are. Forget the face that was yours before you were born. You have become who you are, and that is all you will ever be. Dead, Jesus called it. "Leave the dead to bury the dead," he said. He raised the dead, but he couldn't do anything with those who refused to change their minds. They were deader than dead. Nothing can be done for people like that. How free are we to re-imagine God, the Church, ourselves? How different can we allow God to be? Do we have what it takes for the journey from the left side of our brain to the right side? Do we have what it takes to turn the light around? We are all with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Will we die to our old way of life (Of thinking) and take a chance on being resurrected on the third day? Will we change our mind about what is important? Will we live or will we die? What kind of life will we live? What kind of death will we die? The time is at hand. What will we do?
